Ascent of Mount Sherman on 2007-10-01

Ascent Trip Report

Day dawned clear, but forecast clouds seen moving from the south. Access was from the Fairplay Side, aka SW or 4 mile trail, as opposed to the Leadville aka East of Iowa Gulch trail. 10.4 miles of gravel road generally low grade angle until the last 2 miles. 1st mile paved. Last .25 miles to gate walked as there were some ruts in the road. So, parked at approximately the 11900 elevation (not included in elevation gain).Difficult to sort out which road was the proper one per 14ers.com gps tracks. I generally missed the official up climb point, but found another boot trail up the talus slide, which may have actually shortened the distance a bit, but increased the angle. Makeing the saddle, noticed there were several uptracks, and that most came into the southern end of the saddle, as the saddle had a little hump in the middle. The winds on the saddle and the ridge were extreme, estimating 50mph consistently, not gusty. Mostly from the West. Wore Arcteryx softshell jacket, Arcteryx Goretex hardshell, OR Goretex/pile hat, Cloudveil softshell pants, REI gloves. Stayed warm on the very fast climb, but cold on the descents.Used pole to lean against the wind. Lower Ridge trail braided all over, but top 300 ft, ridge became very,almost dangerously narrow. A wind gust could have throw me onto steep rocks.Topped out at a small knob, then ~ .2 miles to the official summit, marked with a pole and a rock shelter and CMC summit registry. Registry since 8/25/07 was badly torn and essentially full. One party was there ahead of me, although I saw no trace of them or their vehicle.Met a party of 3 women near the top of the ridge, while I descended, they didn't seem prepared for wind. They turned around at this point.